Betrayal
by forerunner919
Summary: Alternate ending to Star Fox: Assault. Fox is fighting the Aparoids, but finds himself in a dilemma, only to have the most unlikely person come up and rescue him. The question is, can Fox fully trust his saviour?
1. Chapter 1

Amidst the flurry of enemies and chaos overhead, Fox could barely focus on what was going around him, the people communicating at him, endlessly calling for help at every moment.

He had no time for them. He had an army of Aparoids ready to suck his blood dry. Fox kept shooting each one down with his sniper rifle, blasting them to bits, sending shrapnel into every direction. Pieces of shrapnel ricocheted off Fox's armour, but the pain from it barely registered in his brain, given the orchestra of terror ringing in the skies.

Fox managed to duck behind a wall, the last remaining thing standing in the building it once held up. He whipped out his communicator, taking a minute to take a well needed breath. "Peppy, what's the position right now?" he yelled out.

"Doesn't look too good," Peppy warned sternly. "Aparoids have encircled just about everything in sight here. We still have a few radar jammers left to take out before we can send in the Arwing."

Fox frantically looked around him, while also keeping low to avoid being spotted by the Aparoids. "Looks like there's a couple nearby where I can get them from. We shouldn't be too much longer before we can get radar back online again." He checked his sniper rifle and noticed that there were only a few shots left remaining before he would have to resort to his blaster. Fox carefully brought his sniper into view, staying low while trying to maintain his focus. A radar jammer quickly came into his sights, and Fox shot it down in an instant, not even giving it a second thought.

Suddenly, Fox heard the deafening shrieks of horror, the distinctive call of the Aparoids, with its wails chilling Fox up and down his spine. Fox turned around and saw three more aparoids closing in behind him, and Fox, having no time, shot the Aparoids down with the sniper, feeling the synthetic blood splatter onto his face.

"Dammit," Fox huffed, catching his breath. "That was my last shot on the sniper. I'm out of ammo." Fox then brought out his lone grenade in his vest, throwing it directly in front of another Aparoid. "You see any more radar jammers around me, Peppy?"

"There's one directly ahead of you in the distance," Peppy responded on the communicator. "Just get that one and we'll be able to send down an Arwing for you."

Fox immediately took out his blaster, shooting down the two Aparoids that had appeared in front of him. "I see it off in the distance, Peppy. I'll try to shoot it from long range." Fox charged up his blaster and sent a shot down towards the lone radar jammer, only for the shot to bounce off it. All the Aparoids noticed the shot and turned their attention towards Fox, standing alone in the open of what remained of Corneria City. Fox shot furiously at the army of Aparoids closing in on him, and managed to take down a few, but Falco swooped down from above and shot down the remainder of the Aparoids around Fox, leaving Fox stunned as his heart started to pace faster than before.

"Careful where you're going, Fox," Falco chipped in a playful manner.

"No need to remind me," huffed Fox, his head spinning from the numerous close encounters with the Aparoids. "Just tell me how to take down that thing without a sniper rifle."

"Where is it?" yelled Falco. "Maybe I can take a few shots at it."

"There's no point," sighed Peppy. "The radar jammers need to be taken down on the ground, and not from above where the jammers can see the shots coming. Use one of the rocket launchers, if you see one, Fox."

Fox noticed one of the Cornerian soldiers slumped over against a wall, and took the rocket launcher that had been cradled in his arms. Fox set up the rockets and after barely having time to aim the rocket, fired it at the radar jammer. When the rocket hit, the jammer fell a few feet, but stayed afloat. Fox took the rocket launcher and fired recklessly at the jammer, striking it as many times as he could before the jammer finally fell down and crashed into the ground. It still remained active, but limped around on the ground. Fox ran over to the jammer, staring directly at it as the jammer cracked and fizzled in front of him. He took out his blaster and shot it to pieces, and instantly, the radar popped open in his communicator, and the radio signals instantly became much more clearer by the second.

"Yippee!" Slippy screamed at the top of his lungs in childish glee. "The radar's back!"

"Thanks, Fox," Krystal replied in relief. "We can find the enemies much easier now thanks to you."

"Thanks, guys," said Fox, leaning back on a wall, sweating from exhaustion. "Peppy, send down an Arwing, please."

Peppy jumped around in excitement. "Almost forgot about it, buddy! Here you go, Fox, take down as much of the droids as you can!"

Fox happily noticed the Arwing appear on the radar screen of his communicator, and immediately ran to retrieve it. "This should make my job much easier," panted Fox, as he sprinted his way towards the Arwing. It was perched on top of a helipad, convenient enough for him to get on and blast right off into the skies.

Fox approached the Arwing, gearing himself to jump right into the cockpit, when the Arwing blew up right in his face, nearly blinding Fox as a fireball flashed in front of his eyes. Fox stuttered in exasperation and shock as the ground shook around him. "Damn... must have been distracted. Peppy, you'll have to send..." Fox checked his radar as he spoke, and stopped when he saw a dozen Aparoids closing in on where he was.

"Fox? What's going on?" Peppy shouted in confusion.

Fox looked frantically around him, speechless as the terrifying machines zeroed in to where he was. Above him, Fox could hear the familiar hum of a foreign ship, with its red livery contrasting with the pale blue Cornerian sky.

"Now what?" Fox stuttered, drawing out his blaster, only realizing the size of the Aparoids around him. He dodged around the Aparoid directly in front of him, as he got a closer look at the ship flying above him. "The Wolfen? How's that possible?" Fox fired his blaster in rapid succession at the Aparoids, slowly backing himself away from the army as they kept marching towards him. The Aparoids started firing back at Fox, and Fox took a few shots, moving backward in pain. After another hit, Fox tripped on the ledge behind him, only just noticing how high up he was on the helipad. Fox frantically waved his arms to try to grab the ledge, but couldn't stop himself from falling over, as Fox screamed in terror to the abyss of Aparoids below him, freefalling into a grave ready to bury him.

After what seemed like minutes of horror, a ship flew directly under where Fox was going to fall towards, and as Fox fell onto the ship and rolled on the wings, Fox instinctively grabbed onto the edge of the ship, letting the ship carry him over to safety, even as it flew up and above the buildings that once defined the landscape of the city.

Fox looked up into the sky, barely able to catch his breath, when he glanced over who was piloting the ship that had saved him from being eaten alive by the Aparoids. He looked at the pilot and couldn't help but notice the pilot be strikingly familiar, but also jarring at the same time, seeing the grumpy look on the pilot's face.

"Wolf? But..."

"Don't say anything about me, pup," Wolf growled. "Just get those damned bugs off my tail!"

Fox went to grab his blaster, but found it wasn't in his holster or in his hands. "I must have lost it when I was falling…" Fox found himself speechless, as the wind rushed into his face as the Wolfen started to slowly pick up speed.

"Well, hang on then," Wolf bickered. "I'm not going back to save you again if you fall off."

Fox nervously held on to the wing of the Wolfen, afraid to say anything or move suddenly. Fox could feel another Wolfen go up behind him, and as Wolf carefully turned his ship, the other Wolfen fired at the Aparoids trailing Wolf. Fox ducked to take cover from the lasers firing from the second Wolfen, and as the smoke cleared, Fox could clearly see Leon inside, glaring back at Fox as he followed Wolf's ship.

"Did we have to save this little twerp?" Leon quipped. "I'd rather get rid of him now while we have the chance."

"Be quiet," Wolf snapped back. "There's no time to talk about this. Just give me a clear pathway so I can quickly land this thing, and then Fox can jump off. I can't maneuver this while he's my wingman."

Leon moved ahead of Wolf without saying a word, then shot down two more Aparoids in front of Wolf, clearing the path ahead of both of them. Wolf then lowered his Wolfen to ground level, never stopping the ship but slowing it down enough that someone could easily outrun it if they wanted to.

"Get off here, Fox," ordered Wolf. "I'll take care of the rest of the Aparoids on the sky, just take care of as many as you can on ground level."

"Got it," Fox replied. "Peppy, there's no sense sending down an Arwing if I'm going to stay at ground level, so send me a Landmaster. I should be covered if there's any other Aparoids directly in front of me."

"Right away," Peppy responded, signalling down a Landmaster right in front of Fox. Fox jumped right inside the Landmaster and mowed down as many Aparoids as he could in front of him, sending a flurry of charge shots, taking down the Aparoids in as many chunks as he could. With Star Wolf providing backup in the air, Fox was able to carve his way through the Aparoid army, showing them no mercy.

"Incoming vessel approaching at high speed," buzzed Rob 64, distracting Fox from his battle. "Identity unknown."

Peppy glanced over at the radar screen. "That ship looks awfully familiar... Wait a minute! That's the General's ship! How could the radar not pick that up?"

"HELP!" General Pepper screamed, not giving any of the team a chance to react. "I've been attacked... the Aparoids... they're inside me already..."

"What?" Fox halted the Landmaster in shock. "That's impossible!"

"I'm afraid so," whimpered General Pepper. "There's nothing anybody can do now... just shoot me down while I'm still here, don't let the Aparoids take over my body..."

As General Pepper was saying this, his flagship flew over the city and started shooting at allies, hitting their ships in a flurry of rage.

"Hey! What's the big idea?" Slippy yelled.

"What are you doing, General?" Krystal screamed.

Their pleas went unanswered, however, as the General kept firing away at both Star Fox and Star Wolf. Eventually, General Pepper found Panther scurrying away from the battle, and followed him closely as Leon tried to escape. The General then managed to hit the back of Panther's engine, sending it into flames. Panther held on to the controls of his Wolfen as much as he could until he got level with the ground, eventually landing hard into the pavement and crashing right into a building, plowing right through it without hardly leaving a trace, until finally screeching to a halt.

Panther quickly got out of the Wolfen and jumped out of the way of the burning wreckage he left behind. "Damn... that was my favourite cafe I just totaled. I'm never going to forgive myself for that."

Wolf saw Panther escape the wreckage and breathed a sigh of relief. "Well, at least Panther made it out ok. Leon, make sure nobody's behind me while I shoot down the General."

Fox stopped his Landmaster immediately. "What? You can't do that, Wolf!"

"He's right..." the General sobbed, as his body writhed in his cockpit." My body's being taken over by the Aparoids... shoot me down before they take control of my life!"

Fox solemnly sat in the Landmaster, shaking at the controls. "No... I can't do that... not after what you've done for Corneria!"

Wolf shook his head. "There's no choice, Fox. It's either him or us. The Aparoids don't take any prisoners. If we shoot him down, there's no chance he'll spread his disease to anyone else."

Fox smashed his fist into the dashboard. "I can't do that, Wolf! I'll never shoot down General Pepper!"

"You must shoot me, Fox," groaned General Pepper, as his voice started to digitally crackle under influence from the Aparoids. "That's an order! Shoot me down before I completely turn into an Aparoid!"

Fox shook in fear, unable to speak or move, staring at the destruction in front of him...

"Fox! Look out!" Krystal screamed, snapping Fox out of his trance. An army of Aparoids encircled around Fox's Landmaster, and Fox was able to roll out of his way just in time to avoid their fiery barrage.

Wolf noticed Fox get quickly surrounded and growled in anger. "Well, if you can't take him down... I'll take him down myself."

"Wait a minute!" Fox rushed a few bombs at the Aparoids in front of him, frantically trying to clear some space to reach the General.

Wolf ignored Fox and the rest of his team, and sped directly towards the General's flagship, shooting as much as he could before General Pepper had a chance to fight back, as the General screamed in agony.

Fox could only look up towards the skies where General Pepper and Wolf were, helpless to change what was going on. "Why… is this happening?"

It soon became obviously apparent that General Pepper's ship was under great stress, with the onslaught of lasers from Wolf taking its toll on the flagship, and the Aparoids chewing up what remained. The flagship started to catch fire and careened downwards towards the sea, growing in speed by the second. General Pepper tried to steer the flagship as much as he could, but it was no use. "I never thought it would come down to this…" he cried out, his voice more metallic than ever. "Just let me defend my honour…"

At once, his intercom cut out, leaving no sound, not even static. Fox rushed over on his Landmaster towards the coastline, trying to prevent the inevitable. "General…"

Wolf then took once final charge shot at General Pepper's flagship, blasting it into pieces, as it smashed into the water, sending shockwaves all around the epicenter. The sound the flagship made during the explosion rang out throughout the skies, which was then followed by a deafening silence, nothing but the sight of destruction all across Corneria surrounding it.

The whole Star Fox team sat where they were, completely silent and bereft. Nobody dared speak into the intercom, lest they disturb the peace they were fighting for.

Fox, in particular, got out of the cockpit as the last of the Aparoids scurried away from the city, and sat on top of the Landmaster, emptily staring into the blood red sky as the sun started to set, with the sounds of the carnage burning away in the background.


	2. Chapter 2

The solemn mood remained as the Star Fox team returned back to the Great Fox, but there was no time to mourn. For the time being, Beltino Toad had to detail a new plan to take down the Aparoids once and for all.

"This new program we are working on will wipe out each and every last Aparoid," explained Beltino. "The big mistake we made 15 years ago was thinking they were self-sufficient. But really, the power they get comes from one giant source, protected by none other than the Aparoid Queen."

Falco raised his eyebrows in a rare show of emotion. "Aparoid Queen, huh? So, why haven't we seen her before?"

"That's because the Queen lives in the Aparoid Homeworld, surrounded by the biggest droves of Aparoids ever seen, bigger than the army that took down Corneria. The homeworld itself is surrounded by miles upon miles of Aparoids, all being nourished by the Queen herself. The homeworld is located in a distant corner of the Lylat System, only accessible by our orbital gate. If we go in any other way, they'll take us down in an instant. But if we sneak in with the orbital gate, we can get in to the homeworld."

"That sounds like a great idea, Beltino," replied Fox. "So how will we take down the Aparoid Queen?"

"We're developing a program that will self-destruct all the Aparoids in one blow," explained Beltino. "If we send this to the Queen, we'll be able to take her out, and all the other Aparoids won't be able to feed off the Queen anymore. The only problem is getting there in the first place. We have to time the entry into the homeworld just right, or else we'll all end up in another place entirely, or worse - right into an army of Aparoids."

"That's fine, Beltino," exclaimed Fox. "Just tell us when, and we'll be ready to take them out!"

Beltino turned away from Fox, trying not to appear embarrassed. "Umm... we can't go in yet."

Falco threw up his hands in frustration. "Why not? Don't tell me you don't have the program ready yet..."

Beltino shook his head.

Slippy stood up from his seat. "He only figured this out a few hours ago. Our buddies down at the lab are working as hard as they can to get this program underway!"

"Thanks, Slip," sighed Falco. "Just one more thing before we go into the homeworld... do we have to bring Star Wolf with us?"

"I don't see why not," Krystal responded. "We could always use more help for the cause."

Fox sighed, shaking his head. "I don't know... I know they mean well, but I just have a bad feeling about them. I've learned not to trust them."

Peppy stepped into the conversation, sensing Fox's doubt. "I don't quite trust them, either, but... it's the only option we have. Besides, they can provide valuable backup when delivering the program to the Aparoid Queen."

"I'll definitely give it some thought," sighed Fox. "For now, we'd better relax until the program is set to go. Beltino, let me know when it's ready... I'll be in my quarters."

As the Star Fox team left the bridge, Fox went over to the back of the base, away from the rest of the team, and headed straight to his room, when he felt a presence around him, like he was being watched. Fox's muscles tensed up as he turned around and noticed Wolf standing behind him, barely paying any attention to anyone around him.

Fox gulped as he slowly approached Wolf. "Hi... You good?"

"Yes," Wolf responded, clearing his throat. "I couldn't help but overhear the conversation with you and that toad. You're saying the program will take out all the Aparoids in one shot?"

"That's what he's saying," Fox replied. "I'm not sure how exactly all of it works; you'd have to ask him or Slippy. I'm not very good at how science works."

"Nah, I won't bother," growled Wolf. "If the old man's anything like that tadpole of his, I don't want to go anywhere near him."

Fox brushed aside the comment. "Sure... Listen, Wolf, about what you did for me on Corneria..."

"Don't mention it," Wolf said, interrupting Fox. "I figured we'd have a better chance of defeating the Aparoids with you alive than dead."

Fox stood in the middle of the hallway as Wolf leaned against the wall, content to be at peace for the time being. Wolf then looked back up at Fox, looking slightly more irritated. "Is there something you need, or...?"

Fox rubbed his hands on his face, trying to put his eyes back in focus. "I'm sorry, I'm just... I know we needed to kill General Pepper, but... he meant so much to me."

Wolf glared right back at Fox. "You think so? Your point of view is so different from mine. You'll never understand, Fox. Frankly, it was an easy decision for me. Not just for my sake, but his."

"What makes you say that?" Fox's irritation was rising, just the same as his blood, and every muscle in his body restrained him from strangling Wolf where he was.

"You ever saw someone taken over by the Aparoids, Fox? Like, actually taken over as if they were some kind of food for those... things? Have you ever thought about that? Remember the first attack from the Aparoids 17 years ago? I remember that very clearly."

Fox scratched his head. "I don't know why nobody brought it up until now."

"Of course," sighed Wolf. "It's not something the Cornerian Army talks about at all. Only a few people know about it... including myself."

"What?" Fox jumped. "You mean you were on that ship?"

"I wasn't just there, Fox... Both of my parents were there, too. They were on that same Cornerian Fleet that got destroyed by the Aparoids. They were exploring a new part of the Lylat System, somewhere nobody else had gone there before. We were the first to figure out why nobody had gone in that part of the system before."

Fox let out a heavy breath in disbelief. "So you mean to say that they..."

"They were both killed in the battle," said Wolf bereftly. "I'll never forget their pain and agony when they became assimilated into the collective, turned into machines. It was... the most horrifying thing I've ever seen in my life. Just seeing your parents being tortured and agonized into sheer material... I don't want to talk about it detail right now. But while your parents had the pleasure of dying after a date with Andross, my parents were eaten alive by those things."

Fox stood there in shock, frozen in time. He took a while to process the information inside his mind, placing all the pieces together. "I had no idea... I'm so sorry."

Wolf leaned back against the wall, facing away from Fox. "I don't expect you to be sorry. But at least you know my side of things."

Fox stood there for a minute, soaking in all the information inside of him. Fox shuddered to think about the horror of seeing his parents being murdered in front of his eyes, seeing them being mutilated by the Aparoids.

The silence continued between the two of them, before Wolf decided to stand away from the wall and walk away from Fox. "Well... We should start planning the battle inside the Aparoid Homeworld. Somehow I don't think we'll be very welcome at all in there."

"We can't really do anything until we get to the homeworld itself," explained Fox. "But I figure we could go down together and deliver the self-destruct program while everyone else provides air cover."

Wolf stood still in deep thought for a couple of seconds. "That should leave us with five ships in the air, if all goes well. We'll see what happens."

Just as the two were going back to their own quarters, when the alarm bells started blaring all across the ship, sending Fox's heartrate racing as the two ran over back to the bridge.

"Incoming Aparoid forces approaching the orbital gate," Rob 64 buzzed, as Fox and Wolf rushed into the front of the bridge.

Krystal was looking outside the window, overseeing the gate as it orbited around Corneria. "There's quite a number of them surrounding us, Fox. We'd better take them down!"

"Then there's no time to waste," declared Fox. "Everyone get into their ships! Let's rock and roll!"

"I'll get Rob and myself into the Great Fox," replied Peppy, as every other pilot ran towards the hangars of the base, hurriedly stepping into their ships and blasting off into space, seeing dozens of Aparoids swarming the base and the orbital gate.

"There's too many of them!" screamed Slippy, as he bounced around in the cockpit of his Arwing.

"Nothing we can't handle," Fox responded back, as he set his sights on the group of Aparoids flying around him, sending a charge shot into the group and taking them down with one shot.

Out of the corner of his eye, Fox could see the three Star Wolf ships flying in formation, taking down as many of the Aparoids as they could. Confident of their abilities, Fox flew away from them, and headed towards the other band of Aparoids, shooting them down one by one as he flew beside them.

"I've got good news for everyone!" exclaimed Beltino, distracting Fox from his rage of fury against the Aparoids. "The program is almost complete! We'll be able to get ourselves down to the homeworld soon!"

"We haven't got much time to waste," said Peppy, onboard the Great Fox. "Once the program is ready, we should head over there as soon as possible. Radar is showing that there's more Aparoid forces on the way."

"Just get yourselves to the homeworld," assured Beltino, "We'll take care of ourselves once you guys are gone. What matters now is that we need to be protected while these guys are trying to take us down! Once you're gone, we can leave the base alone for them to have."

"Sounds like a plan, boss," Falco responded. "We'll do our best to take them down!" At that point, Falco sent down a smart bomb in the middle of the battle area, taking out some Aparoids in the process, but the blast got dangerously close to Fox, forcing him to dodge out of the way out of the smart bomb's wake.

"Watch where you're sending that, man!" Fox yelled.

"Sorry," Falco replied, not saying another word.

Fox brushed aside the near miss as he snapped his mind back into action, crushing over any Aparoid that got in his flight path.

"Incoming missiles approaching towards the gate," buzzed Rob 64, in an alarmed tone.

"What?" Fox nearly swerved towards an Aparoid ship upon hearing the words. "Where are they?"

"They're showing up on radar right about now," Peppy confirmed. "Take those missiles out, everyone! Don't let even one of them through!"

"Got it," replied Fox. "Krystal, back me up while I chase down the missiles!" At once, Fox sped off towards the first missiles in front of the whole formation and shot directly at them with his laser, rapidly firing at them so much that his hands were starting to become stiff from handling the controls so firmly.

"I'll take care of the missiles, too," Wolf said, following his Wolfen closely behind Fox. Wolf started shooting directly at the missiles in front of Fox, as the two helped blow up the first group of missiles that had appeared.

Fox checked his radar and found more missiles quickly surrounding the base. "I'll split off and take care of the left side," Fox explained. "We'll be able to take down more missiles that way."

"Good idea," Wolf said, as he kept firing at the missiles in front of him. Wolf shot his lasers furiously until the missiles in front of him exploded into a million pieces, but after the debris cleared out of his flight path, an army of Aparoids formed up, waiting to attack on Wolf's ship. Wolf instinctively barrel rolled out of the way, barely avoiding the Aparoids as he jerked the controls heavily towards one side, hurdling his head towards the edge of the cockpit.

Wolf felt his ship spiral out of control as it spun and hurtled towards another ship. Wolf frantically jerked the controls in one direction, bringing the Wolfen back onto level air, but the ship was still going at a fast pace, making everything around Wolf into a blur. Wolf blindly shot at the Aparoid in front of him, before looking downwards to check his radar to see where the missiles had gone. While he was searching for the next missile to shoot down, more Aparoids approached Wolf from behind, firing directly at the Wolfen's engine, triggering numerous alarms on the ship.

Barely able to catch his breath, Wolf sped away from the pack of Aparoids that had snuck up behind him and swung the Wolfen back around to shoot them down. But another swarm of Aparoids attacked Wolf, startling him in the process as he desperately shot his lasers in rapid succession, not even letting his fingers off the triggers, constantly firing away until the lasers themselves had enough and shut off, delivering yet another alarm to Wolf, further distracting him. "Dammit," Wolf grunted under his short breath, "overloaded the damn lasers..."

Wolf moved out of the way of the formation of Aparoids he was shooting at, but unable to defend himself, the Aparoids quickly took advantage of the stricken Wolfen and swarmed around the ship.

Panicked thoughts surged into Wolf's head, overwhelming him as he hardly had enough time to think about the ship's alarms blaring in the background, never mind his own predicament. As his muscled tensed to the point where they felt like they were going to explode, a sense of dread started to creep into Wolf, something that he hadn't felt in years, not since his parents were swallowed up by the Aparoids 17 years ago. His mind started to shudder as the image of his father being assimilated and mechanized while he writhed in agony replayed in his head...

"Is this it?" Wolf quietly said to himself, almost shuddering in fear. His hands grew closer to the button where a smart bomb would detonate right inside his Wolfen, blowing himself up with the rest of the Aparoids following behind him. "If I'm going to die here, I'm not going to let the Aparoids destroy me..."

Wolf took a deep breath, filtering the blaring alarms out of his mind, shuddering and shaking inside the cockpit, gritting his teeth.

"Well... here goes..."

Wolf laid his finger on the button, but felt an explosion happen behind him, and some lasers filtering through from behind. It startled Wolf enough to take his finger off the button and back onto the steering controls, frantically moving his head in every direction to see where the shots were coming from. "Leon? That you? Panther?"

At that point, Wolf's lasers suddenly came back online, and finding a couple of Aparoids in front of him, didn't hesitate in shooting them down and making them history.

As the debris from the last two Aparoids filtered away from his flight path, Wolf soon found out who had helped him out earlier, as he flew his ship beside Wolf's, giving a smile of confidence back as the two looked at each other.

Wolf raised his eyebrows in stunned admiration. "Fox? But..."

"Thought I'd return the favour," Fox replied, saluting Wolf back.

Wolf turned away from Fox, looking back towards the battle in the distance. "Never mind that... let's just get the rest of the missiles."

"There isn't a whole lot left," Fox confirmed, looking back on his radar. "Falco and I were taking more of them down while you were in that jam. Then I noticed you were in trouble, and... well, Falco took care of some more missiles while I helped you out there."

Wolf didn't know what to say in return, and decided to fire up his engines back to full throttle again, having gotten a well-deserved rest in the last minute. "The last missiles are straight ahead, I'll get right at them, Fox."

Fox followed closely behind Wolf as the two shot directly at the remaining missiles, being free to fire at them at full strength, with hardly any Aparoids following behind them. The missiles duly got destroyed in quick succession, and the radar fell silent for the first time in what seemed like ages, giving much needed relief for the two teams.

"Yippee!" Slippy belted at the top of his lungs. "We did it!"

Wolf shook his head in aggravation as his intercom was bombarded with Slippy's jubilant reaction. Suddenly, the radar popped back to life again, giving one giant spot far into the distance.

"Danger. Incoming missile detected," alarmed Rob 64.

Falco turned to see the incoming object growing in size by the minute as it appeared from the warp that it came in. "Umm, that doesn't look like missile..."

"Never mind that," barked Wolf. "Whatever it is, it doesn't look very promising." Shortly after, Wolf sped towards the large object, resembling a spaceship more than a missile, as it darted towards the base.

"It seems to be going straight for you guys, Beltino," said Fox, communicating back to the base. "How's the program going, Beltino?"

"Almost done," said Beltino, scrambling around on the bridge. "We'll transport it to each one of your ships once we have it complete."

Fox's radar then alerted him of the arrival of more Aparoids following closely behind the missile-like ship. "Better get the gate fired up, then," ordered Fox. "We don't want to waste any time at all."

Wolf started scanning the slow moving object as he flew around it. "There seems to be a lot of armour, but I found an open spot to attack this thing." Wolf then shot at the back of the object, taking a lot of effort as it slowly but surely started to weaken until it broke apart, and started to disintegrate.

"Is that it?" Wolf asked, spinning through the debris. Suddenly, he noticed the object start to pick up speed. "What's going on?" he yelled.

"It seems to be a multi-part missile," confirmed Slippy. "The more we take it down, the faster it goes!"

"That's crazy!" Falco shouted, as he started to go towards the object. "Now what are we supposed to do?"

"Keep firing at it until we blow the whole thing up," ordered Wolf, as he resumed shooting at the missile again, only to be impeded by the thick armour. "What the... has the open spot moved?"

"Here it is," Leon confirmed, shooting at the side of the missile. "Those bastards sure know how to annoy the hell out of us." Leon and Wolf both fired endlessly at the missile, until more debris started to fly off in front of them, leaving a blaze of smoke in its wake, only for another part of the missile to speed away from the wreckage.

"Warning. Warning. Missile approaching," Rob 64 alerted.

"Damn..." Wolf rammed his fist on the controls in frustration. "Where's the open spot now?"

"Seems to be at the front this time," said Peppy, looking on from the base. "Get that missile down before it strikes us!"

"Damn..." Wolf rammed his fist on the controls in frustration. "Where's the open spot now?"

"Seems to be at the front this time," said Peppy, looking on from the base. "Get that missile down before it strikes us!"

Fox rushed in from the ongoing battle to the front of the missile. "The open spot is larger than the others, but it's at an awkward angle... and the speed doesn't help, too..."

"Don't worry about us, Fox," said Wolf. "Just shoot like crazy and don't stop!"

Fox followed Wolf's instructions and shot as much as he could to the front of the missile, while Falco shot at it from the other side. Wolf went above the missile and turned the ship around, facing the missile from afar as it sped towards the base. It soon became apparent how close the missile was getting towards the base, and Wolf nearly froze in fear. "Hurry up, everyone, the missile's really close!"

Wolf and Leon then blasted right to the front of the missile, joining in the attack with Falco and Fox. Suddenly, their radars started blaring away, as the Aparoids started swarming the base again, attacking the ships shooting at the missile.

Falco did his best to ignore the Aparoids surrounding his ship, as the shields started to weaken. "Go away, you pests! I don't have time to take care of you!"

Wolf decided to set up the smart bomb he had saved earlier and set a delay on the bomb, firing it forward and planting it right onto the front of the missile, right through the open spot. A few seconds later, as the Aparoids started taking meaningful damage onto his ship, the smart bomb deployed and destroyed what was left of the missile, sending shockwaves in the area.

Fox let out a breath after the last of the missile disintegrated into dust. "That was too close..." Fox then noticed a new program being installed into the ship's programming, quickly downloading itself into the system.

"The program's complete!" shouted Beltino, as the rest of the programming crew started celebrating around him. "We can finally get going to the homeworld!"

"Good work, everyone!" Peppy replied. I'll get Rob and I into the Great Fox as quickly as I can. Get into the gate and we'll follow closely behind you!"

As the two teams formed near each other towards the orbital gate, Fox noticed the Aparoids were drawing further away from the team and closer towards the base, where Beltino still remained.

"Beltino! Are you ok?" Fox yelled.

"We'll be fine, just go ahead," Beltino replied. "We'll abandon this base if we have to. Just get through the gate and deploy the program!"

As the orbital gate breathed into life and gave its distinctive green afterglow, Fox had to leave Beltino at the back of his mind and charge forward into the homeworld, not saying a word as he got closer to the gate.

"They'll be fine, Fox," Wolf said, breaking the silence. "They know how to get out of there in a hurry. Just focus on the mission."

Fox looked around him and mentally confirmed the seven ships, four from Star Fox and three from Star Wolf, all flying in formation towards the gate as it opened in front of them. Fox took a deep breath as his ship entered into the gate and appeared on the other side, overseeing the Aparoid homeworld, and saw the rest of the ships enter closely behind him.

Krystal looked onwards towards the Aparoid Homeworld, as it resembled a nest for the creatures to live in. "So... this is where the Aparoids live, then... I never thought it would look so peaceful."

Wolf's face grew foul on the remark. "I very much doubt the homeworld is peaceful at all."

Slippy started analyzing the homeworld as soon as he got the chance to break the conversation with Wolf. "It looks like the entrance to the homeworld is very simple to get into… but I'm starting to get stronger energy readings from the entrance as well!"

The pilots looked over to the entrance, and found that it started to form up a shield blocking the path inside to the homeworld. Falco zoomed over to the entrance and tried shooting at it, but the lasers bounced right off the shield and back towards the formation, forcing everyone to dodge out of its way. "Jeez, do they know we're here already?" he groaned.

Fox searched around the formation, ignoring Falco's complaints. "Has the Great Fox come in yet? Maybe they can help analyze this thing."

Almost on cue, the Great Fox started appearing from the gate. Fox relaxed inside his cockpit, but sat upright again as he started hearing the familiar cries of the Aparoids coming out of the gate. "Where's the Aparoids coming from? I thought we didn't have any Aparoids following us through the gate!

Fox looked over to where the Great Fox was, and found the entire rear of the mothership covered in Aparoids, swarming the machines as much as they could, disintegrating everything that came in its path. The engines started to engulf in flames as it careened towards the front of the homeworld.

"Out of the way, everyone!" Peppy declared, sweating from head to toe. "We're going to bust through that entrance if he have to!"

Fox swerved his Arwing to the back of the Great Fox, trying to shoot as many of the creatures as he could off the ship. "Peppy! We're on our way to help you!"

"It's no use," Peppy sighed. "We might as well go out with a bang! Rob, divert all energy to the main guns!"

Rob 64 typed away as usual, oblivious to the flames and alarms blazing around him. "Warning. Hull reaching critical levels. Hull breath imminent."

The Great Fox fired its main lasers at full capacity, but even it wasn't enough to make a dent through the entrance. Peppy ignored the warnings made by Rob 64 and put all the thrusters as fast as they could go, speeding directly into the entrance at full speed.

Slippy cried out in terror, seeing the Great Fox speed directly towards the entrance. "Don't go, Peppy! We need you!"

Fox heard the repeated calls from his teammates pleading Peppy not go charge towards the entrance. But Peppy kept charging onwards, gaining more speed by the second. Fox stared at the Great Fox, as it was being disintegrated by the Aparoids. "There's nothing I can do," Fox said grimly to himself, with the radio off. "I don't want the Aparoids to take over his body."

As the Great Fox was about to hit the front gate, Peppy shut his eyes closed, trying to keep his mind away from his impending doom. His body was shaking as he kept thinking of his happiest memories, thinking about his wife, Vivian, his best friend, James, both of whom he was certain he'd be joining soon in the afterlife. "I'm coming soon," Peppy told them. "Just one more duty left to do."

Peppy took a deep breath, awaiting his fate. Suddenly, he felt the Great Fox halt dead in its tracks, and Peppy was thrown forward across the bridge, tumbling down past the controls and onto the ground. Peppy looked up towards the front of the bridge, seeing the entrance break open in front of him, as the bridge started to break open into the void of space.

Fox noticed the entrance open up and set his hands back onto the controls. "We don't have a time to waste! Let's get in before the entrance closes up again!"

Krystal moved her ship towards the entrance, going there at full speed. "The window of opportunity is short, everyone. Let's not hesitate any longer!"

The rest of the Star Fox team followed behind Krystal, and went in formation through the entrance, with Star Wolf trailing close behind. Moments after the two teams went inside the Aparoid homeworld, the entrance closed up behind them, and the Great Fox lit up in a blaze, leaving nothing but a bright light in its wake, blinding the pilot's rear view mirrors.

Fox's heart sank, knowing fully well what happened to the Great Fox. "So long, Peppy… I won't let your sacrifice be in vain."


	3. Chapter 3

Gazing downwards towards the Aparoid homeworld, Slippy analyzed the center of the colony, as it was surrounded by what seemed like an endless amount of energy, as thick as the dense fog in the sky.

"We can't go inside the core of the homeworld unless we take down the generators powering the shield," explained Slippy. "The generators themselves appear to be guarded by a number of Aparoids, each of them much more powerful than the ones we faced earlier."

Krystal looked behind her ship, seeing that the entrance had been sealed up, not allowing anyone else through after Star Fox and Star Wolf had snuck through. "With nobody else around for backup at the time being, we'd better get this plan right, for everyone's sake."

Fox found the six generators on his radar, and delegated accordingly. "Falco, Krystal, Slippy, take care of the generators on the left side. The rest of us will take care of the ones on the right. Once the generators are out, Wolf and I will try to get into the core. But just in case both of us don't make it through, remember that all of you have the self-destruct program on you, so anyone can get through. But we'll need to be backed up from the air once we enter the core."

The two groups then split off, but Panther, riding with the rest of Star Wolf, immediately found himself in trouble. A group of Aparoids swarmed his Wolfen and surrounded him without giving him a chance to breathe. Wolf fell behind the pack and shot down as many of the Aparoids as he could, but there was still a couple of Aparoids left remaining that latched onto the wing of Panther's Wolfen. Panther shook his Wolfen from side to side to shake off the Aparoids from his wing, but they held on for dear life.

"Hold still, Panther!" Wolf shouted, carefully aiming his lasers. "Let me try and shoot the damned things off your ship."

Panther nearly stuttered in fear. "Shoot at my ship? Only if you have to, Wolf, but I have another plan…" Panther dived down towards one of the generators, and found a pack of Aparoids guarding the generator. Panther made sure his Aparoid-affected wing was pointing downwards as he turned his ship sideways, making his ship vertical towards the ground. He shot at the pack of Aparoids to distract them, as his infected wing scraped the edge of the generator, pushing the Aparoids off his wing, though Panther could tell the Wolfen was out of balance as a result.

"Those buggers should be off my ship now," Panther sighed in relief. "Any further damage, though, and the wing would have been a goner."

Wolf turned his attention back to the generators surrounding the core. "Just be more careful where you're flying, Panther. There's no time for playing games around here."

Fox was flying above Star Wolf, taking down any enemies that got in their way as Star Wolf focused on the generators. "Any progress on your end, Falco?" he asked.

"Slow but steady," Falco replied back. "If you fire at it long enough, it looks like you can just shoot them down with regular lasers. You just gotta plug away at it."

Almost on cue, the first generator broke apart in the distance, and Slippy immediately celebrated the achievement. "I got one!" he declared.

"Slippy got the first generator?" Wolf said to himself with the radio off. "I have to get a move on, then. It shouldn't be too difficult to break the rest of the generators down."

Wolf immediately set himself onto the nearest generator he could find, and set his lasers onto rapid fire, so that he could mindlessly shoot at the generator while keeping an eye out for any Aparoids circling above him. Wolf zoomed in closer and closer to the generator until he had to move out of the way, baffled at its sturdiness. "Damn… how the hell did that frog blow up that thing?"

Slippy then started shouting as loud as he could on the radio, shrieking like a mad man. "Fox, get these guys off me!" he yelled.

"Be quiet, you idiot," Wolf grumbled. "Let me focus on the generators here!" Wolf could then feel his ship shake for a brief moment, and Wolf looked around him to see what had happened. He saw some smoke spewing from the distance. "Looks like another generator just went," he grinned.

"That's four more to go," smirked Leon, chuckling slightly. "The bird's right, these things are pretty simple to take down. We just gotta keep these pests at bay while we shoot the generators down."

Out in the distance, Falco, Slippy, and Krystal flew in formation towards the generator right beside them, and shot in unison, tearing down the generator in an instant.

"Three more to go," Fox commented after the generator fell. "Maybe you guys should take the next one down in formation as well. I'll watch you from above."

The Star Wolf team quickly followed Fox's instructions, flying right beside each other as they zoomed towards the next generator. Panther cleared the path by shooting down the Aparoids guarding the generator, and then Wolf and Leon sent down a fury of lasers ahead of them, breaking the generator down.

"Only two left," Falco cheered. "Man, this is easy!"

Wolf then heard a shriek of horror outside his cockpit, emanating from the core of the homeworld. Soon enough, the shriek grew louder and louder, and a flock of Aparoids came out of the core, as they yelled out their war cries, sending chills down Wolf's spine.

Memories of seeing his father being mutilated by the Aparoids flooded into Wolf's mind, hearing the same shrill sound that they made seventeen years ago as his parents died in front of him. Wolf didn't notice the Aparoids encircling the entire each one of the ships, as they easily outnumbered the pilots flying around the homeworld, and soon became a menace to handle.

"Where the hell did these things come from?" Falco belted, swerving his Arwing in every direction possible to clear space around his ship.

Leon annoyingly growled back as his engines were becoming overloaded. "Never mind where they came from, just find a way to get rid of them all before we're killed!"

Wolf swung his Wolfen around and followed Leon closely behind, ignoring the Aparoids following him as he sprayed a line of shots towards the Aparoids that were encircling Leon, mowing them down in quick succession.

Leon let out a sigh of relief, but put his attention back to the dashboard of his Wolfen, screaming out in terror. "Shields are going down, Wolf. I don't know how much longer I can go on in this thing."

Soon enough, Falco was then surrounded by the Aparoids, but flew his Arwing into the path of Star Wolf, allowing for them to shoot at the Aparoids in point blank range. Leon and Wolf opened fire at the Aparoids and took down the majority of the pack following Falco, allowing him to focus back on the generator he was trying to shoot down, which was in the distance.

"Now's our chance," Falco yelled on the intercom. "Let's take the rest of the generators down!" Falco sent a charge shot at the bottom of the generator ahead of him in the distance, going down with a spectacular thud.

Fox noticed the generator fall, and darted over towards the last remaining generator, wasting no time in sending over a smart bomb over to make the last of the generators fall. A crackling was heard over the radio shortly after the last generator fell, and Slippy tapped into the radio, analyzing the noises it made.

"The energy field around the core is down," Slippy announced. "I'm still getting a definite energy reading from the core, but it's much weaker than it was before."

Wolf started up the boosters of his Wolfen in anticipation. "I don't trust that the energy field around the core will be down for long. Let's get down there before it seals back up again."

Fox and Wolf flew their ships into the centre of the Aparoid homeworld, mowing down any Aparoids that flew in their path. Wolf in particular kept the controls locked down and kept firing away at the Aparoids, speeding towards the core at full speed.

Fox opened up the menu on his dashboard containing the self-destruct program. "I've got the program ready; I'm going to send it down!" He wasted no time in sending down the missile with the program contained inside, as it went through the core. Fox flew around the core for a minute, waiting for the results.

"Anything going on, Slippy?" Fox asked. "I don't see any action going on yet."

"Hold on a sec, Fox..." Slippy scurried away at his dashboard, waiting for his analyzer to view inside the core. "...I don't know if the program has started working or not. I can't read any major energy changes on here yet."

"Perhaps the program isn't instantaneous," Krystal speculated. "I don't mean to be a devil's advocate here, but Beltino never did mention when the program was going to get active..."

"I think we got bigger problems than that," Falco yelled in panic. "Something's coming right at us!"

Rising from the core was a dark and shadowy figure, appearing much like an Aparoid, but much bigger, covered with pedals all over.

Fox stared at the figure in shock, trembling at its size. "The Aparoid Queen... it has to be the Queen."

Before Fox could fully scan the area around the Aparoid Queen, an army of Aparoids flew out of the core, and as the queen pointed her wing as if to give an order to the Army, the Aparoids charged at once to Star Fox and Star Wolf, scattering them away in a panic. Fox was able to dodge the army quickly, as did Wolf, but the rest of the pilots had more trouble. Panther and Slippy both flew away from the battle scene with Aparoids trailing behind them, and all around the homeworld, Aparoids flew around everywhere, flying randomly around anything they could see in front of them.

"There's too many of them, Fox!" Krystal screamed in agony. "I can't even focus on flying this thing..."

"Just focus on trying to get away from them," Fox told Krystal. "It looks like the only way we're going to defeat the Aparoids is to get rid of the Queen herself. If the Queen goes down, we can inject the program into her, and that should bring down the Aparoids, just like Beltino said the program would do."

Wolf nodded in agreement with Fox's plan. "Let's take down the Queen, then. Together."

Fox and Wolf darted directly towards the Aparoid Queen, while the rest of the pilots were left defending for themselves, completely overwhelmed by the Aparoids. The Queen turned around to face the two pilots as they came charging towards her, and the Queen sent an energy charge right at the two of them, though they were both able to dodge the attack rather easily.

"It'll take more than that to defeat us," Wolf growled, gripping tightly on the controls. Wolf noticed the wings of the Aparoid Queen spread out as she started to spin around in a circle, generating more and more speed. Wolf backed his Wolfen away from the Queen, getting a better glance at the Queen in the process. "Looks like the wings can be taken down easily with lasers," Wolf assessed. He opened fire at the wings covering the Aparoid Queen, and one by one, they started to flake off, revealing a large red area at the center.

"Is the center where the Queen's energy is stored?" Fox wondered out loud.

"Could be," Wolf replied. "Either way, it would do a lot of good taking away her wings. That seems to be the parts which attack most of the time." Wolf got back to work attacking the wings of the Aparoid Queen, and as more and more of the wings started falling off, the center became much more visible.

Fox zoomed nearby the Queen, hit the brakes with his reverse thrusters, and started shooting at the center, making the Queen wince in pain. "That seems to be doing the trick," Fox confirmed. He kept shooting at the Queen at a faster rate, until his brakes let go and made Fox move forward in his Arwing again. As Fox started to move away from the Queen, The Queen sent out a purple mist into the air, completely covering herself in the thick breeze. The mist started to spread across the entire area, making it more impossible for any of the pilots to see very far ahead of them.

"Got any ideas for this, Slip?" Fox asked, slowing down his Arwing to a halt.

Fox didn't hear back from Slippy immediately, but after a few seconds, Slippy bellowed and yelled at the top of his lungs, screaming at the Aparoids chasing him.

"Never mind then," Fox sighed. "It looks like the mist is dissipating, so there's no sense doing anything until we can see again."

As the mist started to fade, all the pilots could see the Aparoid Queen again, but it had regained its wings, covering the center just like it did before.

Fox gripped the controls of his Arwing in anger. "Damn... guess we gotta take down the wings again."

"The wings regenerate themselves?" Wolf said in shock and admiration. He zoomed through the fading mist towards the Aparoid Queen, shooting at the wings as he circled around her. They flaked off just as they did before, falling off like leaves on a tree. The center was slowly revealed to them just as it did before, but Wolf had another plan this time.

"I've got one more smart bomb on my ship," Wolf explained. "I'll use it right here. I might as well try to blast it away." Wolf lined up his lasers and aimed it right at the center of the Aparoid Queen, and shot the bomb as soon as his sights aligned with the Queen. The bomb exploded right on the Queen, and the Queen nearly fell down from the impact, going down on her knees from the impact. But within a few seconds, the Queen got back up, rebuilding her wings just like the previous time.

"Did that do anything?" Fox asked.

"I doubt it," growled Wolf. "Everything we throw at her just seems to brush off her, and she keeps getting back up."

Wolf backed away from the Aparoid Queen to see more her, analyzing every inch to see another attacking point other than the center. It also gave the Queen more time to recover from the attacks the pilots were making, and the wings started glowing, gaining more and more energy.

"There's a charge attack coming through!" Fox blurted, revving up his engines to speed out of the way. The Aparoid Queen sent out an aurora beam wildly in the air, barely avoiding Fox and Wolf. It grazed Falco's ship in the distance, and he had to back away from the Aparoid he was chasing down to recover from the hit. The Aparoid Falco was chasing then turned around and fired directly at Falco, as Falco started taking more damage on his Arwing. Falco looped his Arwing around, ending up behind the Aparoid that was chasing him, and Falco quickly shot down the Aparoid, as it crumbled into the ground.

The Aparoid Queen sent out another energy charge at the pilots as voices started to emanate from the Queen, sending its thoughts from her own mind into the minds of Wolf and Fox. At first, the voices were indecipherable, distorted by the mist that still remained in the air, as well as the thick atmosphere of the Aparoid homeworld. Fox's mind was muddled with these voices, dampening his concentration as the Aparoid Queen continued to throw everything it could at the pilots.

Eventually, the voices started becoming more and more clear, and Fox could figure out what the voices were trying to say. "Join us," they started to say. "Surrender and become a part of us…"

Fox almost shuddered in fear at the voices. "I thought you were dead… All of you…"

Wolf ignored the voices as he dodged the Aparoid Queen's attacks, brushing the voices aside as they intruded into his mind. "Become a part of us, Wolf… It is your destiny. You are only delaying the inevitable."

Fox sent a flurry of shots towards the wings of the Aparoid Queen, revealing the center again. He then sent a charge shot towards the center, and the Queen wailed in agony. The voices inside his head grew louder and louder as Fox and Wolf whittled down on the Queen.

"Fox... don't destroy the Queen. She is the only way we can become as one."

Fox slowed down his Arwing upon hearing Peppy's voice. "But... I thought you were -"

"It is meaningless to survive, Fox. All things must pass eventually."

Wolf noticed Fox slow down in the air, even with the battle going on. "What's going on there, Fox? Move out of the way before someone rolls over you!"

Wolf then noticed a gravelly, sinister voice pop out into his mind, one from his past. "Don't be a fool, Wolf. You know better than to do something this stupid."

"Pigma?" Wolf looked around his ship to look for him. "I thought you were taken in by the Aparoids!"

"Being a part of the collective is more important than money itself... it is the only thing to do."

Wolf growled at the voices in anger. "Something's not right about all this..."

A more authoritative figure then spoke into Fox's mind. "Star Fox... accept defeat."

"General?" Fox shuddered in fear as he noticed the Aparoid Queen build up more strength. "It can't be..."

"There is no reason to go on like this, Fox. Accept defeat and move on, accept your fate as part of us."

Fox tensed up and grasped the controls in a fit of rage, and began shooting at the Aparoid Queen again. The Queen noticed Fox break out of his trance and sent an energy charge right at Fox's Arwing, heavily damaging the engine and sending debris flying into the air. The two then heard another voice from the air, one they had just saw recently.

"Give up Fox," Peppy spoke. "There's no need to fight like this anymore."

"What's going on?" Fox shouted at himself. "Why is everyone like this? Why are they trying to haunt me?"

Wolf shook his head in frustration. "I thought Peppy died just a few moments ago..."

"Wolf..." the next voice said.

Wolf's thoughts suddenly drew blank as he froze in shock, hearing a voice he hadn't heard in years. "Dad? ...is that you?"

"We can be together again, Wolf. Just like you always wanted. We can assimilate to each other, Wolf, and live as one."

Wolf shut his eyes and suppressed the tears from his face, wanting to deny himself what was happening. "It can't be... you would never want to be with those... things..." Memories of his Dad flowed back and forth into his mind, reliving them in an instant as his mind was being torn into pieces. Wolf swirled back and forth between the memories and the voice of his Dad telling him to submit to the Aparoids, to live as one...

"Dad... I made it this far so that I could avenge your death. And if I have to betray my trust in you to do so, then so be it." Wolf charged up his lasers and aimed it at the Aparoid Queen, who was defending off the attacks from Fox at the same time. Wolf let the charge fly right into the center of the Queen, and it absorbed into her like all the other attacks, as if nothing had happened. But Wolf kept shooting at the Queen, and little by little, the Queen started to wear down slowly, collapsing onto her knees again.

At that moment, the shrieks of the Aparoids surrounding the area started to grow weaker and weaker, growing more and more faint as Wolf kept shooting furiously at the Queen. Fox looked around the air and noticed Aparoids falling from the sky, one by one. "What's going on? Is the program starting to finally work?"

"Send down a smart bomb, Fox!" Wolf yelled in desperation. "We won't have much longer before the Queen recovers again!"

Fox immediately delivered the smart bomb towards the Aparoid Queen, and as it exploded directly into her face, the last of the Aparoids started to fall down from the air, and the entire homeworld started to crumble around them.

Fox searched frantically for his teammates. "Where did everyone go? We should get out of here soon... before the homeworld collapses on us."

Suddenly, the Aparoid Queen broke apart from the armour that was encased around her, and out came a more primitive creature, slithering from the armour and into a shelter created by the ground breaking up around her.

"We have to get down there before the Queen finds another way to survive!" Fox shouted, approaching the shelter the Queen went into. Wolf followed closely behind, but stopped as he approached it.

"The opening is too small for a ship to go through," explained Wolf. "Only a person can fit through the opening. Is the air safe to breathe?"

"I'm not receiving any toxicity alerts from my Arwing," said Fox, analyzing his scanners. "It probably won't be very good for us, but if we get out, kill the Queen once and for all, and get right back into our ships, we'll be just fine. But we need to act quickly!"

Fox and Wolf dutifully flew their ships close to the entrance of the shelter the Queen went inside, and jumped right out of their ships, with rifles in their hand. Fox ran first inside on the glossy floor, resembling a slippery tile surface. Fox ran for a bit but stopped soon after he entered in, nearly slipping down onto the glossy floor.

"What happened?" Wolf barked, trailing behind Fox, as he slowed down and stopped alongside him. He then looked on towards what was left of the Aparoid Queen, shaking and trembling inside a vat of fluid, much like the same fluid that flowed inside each Aparoid. It flowed from the vat and down under the floor, giving off the dim light that could make Fox and Wolf see inside the shelter.

Fox was taken aback, standing still on the floor. "My god... I've never seen the Queen be so... frail."

Wolf stepped backwards away from the vat, soaking in the situation in front of him. He stared intently at the Queen, as its eyes were still glowing but slowly fading by the second, losing more and more light from inside.

Fox lowered his rifle, holding it in only one hand as he stared at the Queen in shock. "The Queen is dying right now, Wolf. The program was already working. She just suppressed it until it couldn't suppress it anymore. Anything we did to it didn't matter. The program entered inside her, and it's now starting to infect everything inside her body."

"That would explain why the homeworld is falling apart," concluded Wolf. "If the Queen provides for the homeworld, then the homeworld has nothing to live on. So the Queen is dying, as you said."

"Yes," said Fox, still at a loss of words. "And with the Queen dead, the Aparoids will cease to exist." Fox kept looking at the Queen as she groaned weakly, gasping for air, soaking as much energy as she could from the thick fluid.

Wolf let the Queen writhe in agony, as he stood at the entrance of the shelter, raising his rifle. "The Queen is dying, then... and now it's time for you to pay back for what you did to me all these years, Fox." He fired his rifle right at Fox, still staring at what remained of the Aparoid Queen.

Fox fell forward onto the hard ground and groaned as he struggled to get back up on his feet. "What happened?" he said in a daze, searching for the rifle he dropped.

As Fox turned around, Wolf fired another shot from his rifle and Fox fell backwards into the vat of Aparoid fluid, and Fox screamed out in agony as soon as he fell in, floating on top of the fluid. Fox tried moving his limbs as much as he could, but the thick fluid prevented him from lifting them up, and the fluid soon infested into his body, eating into his muscles and bones, as Fox slowly sunk down in the fluid.

Wolf came closer to the vat, still keeping a fair distance away from the edge so that he wouldn't fall inside, but he was able to see Fox scream out in pain, seeing the Aparoid fluid infest him, taking control of his body. Fox's struggles became weaker, and his cries soon started to die down and become a digitized version of itself. Fox sunk further into the fluid, as the fluid started to surround his chest, and the light in Fox's eyes started to fade and digitize. He lifted his arm up in a vain attempt for someone to grab him, but by then his body was so deep inside the thick fluid it would have been impossible to be pulled out. Wolf looked on, staring at Fox as he succumbed to the fluid, sinking further and further inside.

Soon, all that remained of Fox above the surface was his arms and head, and Fox had stopped calling out for help, by now accepting his fate. As his head started to envelop below the fluid, he lifted up his hand in the air in one last desperate attempt to get out, as his breaths started to become a metallic wheeze. Slowly, Fox crept further and further down into the fluid, until it had reached the point where his face was the only thing Wolf could see from afar. Fox kept his right hand up, but it too, sunk further down, and Fox's voice crackled as his face started to get eaten by the Aparoid fluid, gasping for one last breath, before he sunk into the bottomless pit. Fox had garnered enough energy to call out one last time, tears starting to fall down his face as he croaked one last word to anyone who would hear it: "Goodbye…"

In that moment, Fox's face was fully swallowed up by the fluid, and all that Wolf could see was his hand spasm and shake until it too went into the pit. Wolf stared blankly into space, shuddering and breathing heavily and quickly, as he lowered his rifle. He spoke nothing, but simply stood still in the shelter, alone and unattended. At one moment, his mind was full of intense emotions, yet now, having seen Fox succumb to the fluid, his mind was alarmingly empty. He was completely speechless and stunned, unsure what to do with himself in that moment.

Wolf then felt the whole area rumble around him, and stepped out of the shelter without hesitation. He saw the rest of the homeworld start to break apart and disintegrate, and immediately ran to his Wolfen and jumped right into the cockpit and sped away from the shelter, leaving the Aparoid Queen and Fox behind.

More of the homeworld started to break away in chunks, with some pieces of the earth nearly hitting Wolf as it flew across the sky. Wolf had to dodge quickly out of the way, slowing him down as he noticed the homeworld now start to explode and send a wall of fire directly at Wolf. Wolf sent his thrusters to the maximum it could go on, but he still felt that the wall of fire was quickly catching up to him. He dived down a tunnel leading away from where the fire was going, not checking where the tunnel was headed, in a desperate attempt to get away from the wall of fire creeping up on him.

As Wolf went further and further towards the exit of the homeworld, seeming so close yet so far from where he was as the wall of fire inched closer, he gritted his teeth as the Wolfen gave all that it could towards barrelling out of the homeworld. "This thing better reach Mach 4 soon," growled Wolf, as his engines started to overheat and contort from the heavy G-forces applied at the speed it was going at.

Eventually Wolf could see the void of space in front of him, as the tunnel he was in started to get narrower, and the wall of fire behind him only seemed to be a small step away, as the engines started to squeal and weaken from the extreme stress of the G-forces. Wolf started to hold his breath as he got near the end of the tunnel, closing his eyes as he let the Wolfen drive straight forward towards the exit, hearing nothing but the engines whirring behind him…

Then, silence. Wolf kept his eyes closed, as he suddenly felt how fast his heart was thumping while he was piloting the Wolfen. He pleaded quietly to himself as he breathed heavily in and out. A few seconds had passed when Wolf decided to open his eyes again, albeit very slowly, feeling oddly at peace over the sudden quiet that drew inside his cockpit.

As his eyes opened, he could see the dark skies of space around him, and the collapsing Aparoid homeworld behind him, as the fire stopped right at the exit, and Wolf was now flying far away from the homeworld, leaving everything inside behind into the abyss of space. Wolf exhaled in relief, taking a few more precious breaths as he started to collect himself from the wars raging all around him. And in an instant, the intercom on the Wolfen brought itself to life again, complete with the giddy celebrations of all the other pilots in the battle, both from Star Fox and Star Wolf, as the Aparoids flying in the air started to deactivate in unison.

Soon after the initial celebrations started to die down, all the other pilots' faces grew more and more concerned, as they searched around the air. But they didn't say anything, not wanting to bring up any tough questions, especially right after their decisive victory over the Aparoids.

Eventually, Krystal found the courage to speak up in the awkward silence. "Where did Fox go?" she asked cautiously. "I thought he went in with you, Wolf…"

Wolf took in a deep breath, letting the hums of the engines keep his mind in focus as his mind scrambled for an explanation. He sat inside the cockpit, tensing and relaxing his arms as he braced for emotional impact.

"…I'm afraid Fox didn't make it," Wolf started in a slow and quiet tone. "We both went to face the Aparoid Queen… and the Queen killed him."

Silence filled the airwaves of the intercom, as the shock from the news settled in. Falco was speechless, unable to speak or even say anything that could come close to expressing his grief, and simply buried his head on the dashboard, keeping his eyes shut so as to not let a tear drop from his eye.

Wolf sat back and didn't add on to what happened, maintaining his solemn mood. _No sense apologizing to everyone about this,_ Wolf thought to himself. _It will just make everyone else sadder than they are already._

"Is true that Fox is gone?" asked Slippy, shuddering in disbelief. "How can I trust that you're telling the truth, Wolf?"

"I'm telling the truth, Slippy," Wolf insisted. "I can tell you that it was terrifying seeing Fox get eaten alive by the Queen. I don't want to go into detail… it's not something I should discuss right now.

Krystal put her hand on the window of her cockpit, facing towards the disintegrating Aparoid homeworld. A small tear started to roll down her eye as her voice started to break up in sorrow. "Why, Fox… why did you have to die for us?" Her sadness started to turn towards anger as she clenched her fist, building up tension in her arm. "Damn these Aparoids… Damn them all! So many people sacrificed themselves to save the Lylat System, and yet… it feels all so worthless. Peppy, the General, and now Fox… I can't believe they're all gone."

Falco lifted his head back up from the dashboard, still shaking on the inside. "What am I going to do now?"

The three remaining members of the Star Fox team drifted away from the group, while Leon and Panther flew beside Wolf, as they switched channels so that they could talk privately between each other.

"You ok, Wolf?" asked Leon. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to help out in the battle with the Queen. I got surrounded by the Aparoids, and then… let's just say I'm lucky to be alive."

"Don't worry about it now, Leon," sighed Wolf. "I'm just glad this whole ordeal is over. The Aparoids are finally exterminated once and for all."

"That fluffy little idiot is finally gone, too," Leon added. "I thought he would never get out of our way."

"I suppose," sighed Wolf.

Leon raised his eyebrow in confusion over Wolf's hesitant comment. "What's the matter then? I thought you wanted that scumbag dead."

"I did," Wolf replied. "I just didn't think it would happen so quickly in front of me. I've wanted him dead for some time, after all that he did against me, humiliating me and making me the most wanted man in Lylat. But that's all in the past, Leon. He's dead now, and I don't want to think about him anymore."

"Ok, boss," sighed Leon, leaning back in his seat.

Wolf hazily looked forward into the distance as his mind started being flooded with what had happened to him in the past few days. "I do have to say, Leon… I can't stop seeing Fox dying in front of me, seeing him getting swallowed up by the Aparoids… it reminds me too much of what happened to me in the past. I can't shake it off my mind."

"Forget about him," snarled Leon. "He's dead, just like the Aparoids, and we can finally live freely in Lylat again."

"That's true," conceded Wolf. "We don't have to worry about Fox shooting us down again. But I keep wondering what will happen if somebody finds out about what I did to him. Somebody's going to find out. I just know it."


End file.
